__0__ Days Since Last Fall

Last year when I spent 5½ months in hospital, I vowed to the nursing staff and the physical therapists -- No Falls. When I got home, I told everyone No Falls.

So there I was, using my canes to go the restroom -- it used to be the 2nd men's room, but they put an Occupied/Vacant lock on the door and called it Unisex -- because there's a structural column inside so my walker won't fit. Nearing time for my 10am class, I grabbed my case with the watch in it. Holding the case and keys in my right hand, a pen fell out of the case. So I shifted everything to my left hand -- two canes, keys, case -- so I could bend down and pick it up. Somewhere in this process my hand slipped off the weightbearing cane and...

DOWN GOES FRAZIER.

Now realize I have not been able to get up off the floor in 492 days and I am now splat on my stomach.

On the second HELP a grad student bolted out of the nearby office. I said I needed a chair. Paul, former department chair was there, too, and he went around me through Bradley Commons. Grad student does a great job of locking the chair, with one foot jammed against a wheel so it can't go.

And I'm not sure how I'm going to do this.

I got up from a therapy table and touched the ceiling back in the spring, but we probably had the shoes and AFO brace off. I should push up with my right foot. But once on my knees and leaning on the chair, I could get my left foot up and flat on the ground with the brace. Left foot first was how I used to get up in Olden Times, so I just went for it. Told Paul to reach under my shirt, grab onto my jeans and haul straight up on the count of three.

1... 2... 3... And I am up.

Thought with the blood thinners I'd have some great bruises. Or a scraped knee where I'd felt friction between knee, jeans and carpet when I went down. But other than a few kinks, no discernible damage.